


Collection

by MistressAkira



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Character Study, Crushes, F/F, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Secrets, Slow Burn, am i projecting on lysithea? probably!, but like vaguely its not super important other than they're in the same class, is like annette lovemail masquerading as a fic? you bet!, look they deserve the world
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:54:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28434960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressAkira/pseuds/MistressAkira
Summary: Lysithea is like a locket. She is good at keeping secrets. She is good at keeping it all inside.But she is getting worse at keeping it all locked away.Things break free, seep up from the back of her mind. Thoughts, feelings. There is so much inside her, so much darkness that makes up her person, she can’t let it out.But she has begun wanting to.-----------------------------Lysithea, concessions, confessions. About Annette, and herself.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Lysithea von Ordelia
Comments: 8
Kudos: 24





	Collection

**Author's Note:**

> First lysinette fic!! I've been obsessed with them since April and I've drawn them a bunch but hadn't written anything! About half of this was cobbled together in my phone memos one night I couldn't sleep and then I transferred it over to google docs to try and make something out of it! I hope you enjoy! Small note about the format, each '&' between sections is meant to be read as 'and'!
> 
> Btw, this honestly could have been rated G, but I rated it T to be on the safe side due to some discussions of Lysithea's illness, her symptoms, the death of the Ordelia children, ect. None of it is heavily described but it is there, so!

Lysithea is many things. She believes herself, first and foremost, to be a realist.

Fifteen for less than two moons by the time she arrives at the Officer’s Academy, she knows herself to be the youngest student there. She has worked the hardest to be granted entrance, and she will have to work harder still to achieve her goals.

It’s been a long, excruciating few years, but her wishing well has long since run dry. Shedding blood and tears, showing no fear, anything to survive.

She believes herself, second then, to be an opportunist.

Dark magic heeds her well; there’s so much inside her at this point, it has become an extension of her being. But twisting her weakness to her will, while gratifying, has accomplished nothing lasting thus far. Lysithea cannot outlast herself with complacency. 

So, it’s only logical to transfer into the new professor’s class. 

Byleth was a mercenary before she became a professor. She has practical skills that would be hard to come by in a traditional classroom setting, and what’s more, she is reputedly well trained in faith.

Experience, ability, technique. It’s hardly even worth considering. Lysithea submits her request to transfer before the end of the Garland Moon. 

&

Naturally, for a highly accomplished student such as herself, it is approved. And in the first week of the Blue Sea Moon, Lysithea transfers to the Blue Lions.

Annette is one of the first to introduce herself.

She distinguishes herself immediately. Pale red hair, wide blue eyes like the opaline ones of a doll, she outright _squeals_ when she meets Lysithea for the first time. She and her best friend Mercedes roll out the welcome wagon, completely unexpectedly. They are friendly and cheerful, and it is a shock to the senses to say the least.

Afterwards, Lysithea slowly acquaints herself with the rest of the class; Dimitri is polite, perfectly friendly, Dedue polite and perfectly stoic. Ingrid shakes her hand and treats her respectfully, Felix nods whenever he sees her but as a disturbing aversion to sweets, and Sylvain is a layabout horrendously lacking in self-awareness. Ashe is helpful and often offers to lift objects from high shelves for her, which mildly annoys her but he is kind and sincere, and does little otherwise to take up her time or get in her way.

&

Lysithea fits into her new class about as well as her old one. Which is to say, hardly; not that it matters much. Lysithea is not here to fraternize. 

Many of her new classmates are skilled as well, and are diligent in their own right. Annette sets herself apart here too. She routinely has some of the highest scores, comparably to Lysithea’s own, and frequently can be seen toting around book stacks as tall as she. Lysithea has even overheard tell of her training at the famed Fhirdiad School of Sorcery, and of her esteemed honor status there. 

All her hard work is evident. Lysithea can respect that.

Then, one day, she comes up to Lysithea after class, asking Lysithea to teach her magic. She talks of talent, but understands and sees the hard work, the endless work. She knows she’ll have to work hard to keep up with Lysithea. Pledges to work ever harder.

She is tenacious, ardent, driven. Earnest beyond measure. 

It disarms her. Lysithea acquiesces. 

And it starts small. It’s a small thing, then, to share the materials the professor gives Lysithea in their tutoring. Annette asks many questions, but she is a brilliantly quick study. Half the time, all Lysithea has to do is leave the work out on the table between them, and Annette simply picks it up all on her own. She is a fiercely self-directed learner and hardly requires any prolonged attention. 

Lysithea starts to, though. Pay her attention. Offers criticism, or a suggestion, or cross checks their work together.

It starts small.

These sharings of notes become study sessions. They stay behind after class and engulf an entire desk with their books and parchment. Annette brings snacks baked by her friend Mercedes, muffins bursting with albinean berries and cookies sandwiched around rose jam and brownies topped with candied walnuts, and sometimes even Mercedes herself. 

They start arranging meet-ups in the library when they can’t meet after class. They discuss lectures, training exercises, battle, and in time, other topics. Sweets, the weather, the ducks in the pond Annette saves her dinner rolls to feed and the lovely lilies Lysithea saw growing in the greenhouse. The hours they spend there grow, and they collect candles, stow them in their corner, the one beneath the stairs, light them when the sun goes down and the library grows dark and they are not yet done. 

Friendship blooms between them. It starts small, small as a seed, but with sweets and moonlight, between countless magical tomes, it flourishes. 

* * *

Annette is sweet.

She is kind and easy to cooperate with, and her thirst for knowledge near matches Lysithea’s own. They have excellent conversations that hardly ever feel like a waste of Lysithea’s time, share a variety of similar opinions yet have widely different mindsets, prefer the same teas, and even keep similar hours. Awake until the small hours of the morning, up with the sunrise.

Lysithea finds her curious. Lysithea finds herself drawn in. Always eager to share, Annette has an infectious energy and enthusiasm that she carries with her, transfuses to those around her like magic, like seeds to soil. She is helpful, offering handkerchiefs and encouragement and her wit and her attention.

She insists she calls her Thea. She's _Annie_ , and Mercedes is _Mercy_ , and Lysithea _simply must_ have a nickname too.

Lysithea allows it. Because it saves time, she reasons. _My name is Lysithea von Ordelia, please do not forget it._ She tells everyone. She grows tired of it sometimes.

_But you can call me Thea._

She doesn't tell anyone that. 

The blush that overtakes her face when she even considers it is positively ruinous. But she never stops Annette from calling her as such.

She becomes _Thea,_ then. And that’s small too.

But she begins to notice how much of her time she spends with Annette. That is less so.

&

Annette is like a bellyache.

It’s easy to get caught up. Dragged to tea, to lunch, to dinner, to practice. They spend more and more time together, more of it unplanned, more days than not. Annette is sweet and it's easy to seek her out, to crave her attention, her thoughts.

It’s easy, so Lysithea overindulges. She gets overwhelmed.

It’s difficult, then. She’s not used to this. She has spent most of the last nine years in dark rooms, in the quiet company of her research and dolls and candles; they do not require conversation, they do not require _patience._ She is not used to _this_ , and Lysithea sometimes grows cranky, lashes out when she doesn’t mean to, has no patience and doesn’t want to listen.

It’s very childish.

Annette is kind, but she herself is not always patient. She doesn’t understand why Lysithea has these moods- and it’s not as if Lysithea is at liberty to explain. They end up fighting sometimes. It’s terrible.

It’s terrible because Lysithea doesn’t actually want to upset Annette, but it's especially so because she had forgotten how this felt; it’s terrible, because she has forgotten how _tormenting_ it is. She’d fight with cousins over toys, over treats, over attention. They’d spit and howl, hurl insults and pout, and Lysithea did too, miserable but conducive to it. And then, one day she didn’t have to anymore. In that emptiness was an anguish unlike any she’s ever felt.

She never wanted to feel like that again.

So, in the ways she gets used to Annette, and being dragged to tea, to lunch, to dinner, to practice, with friends and classmates and strangers, she gets better at moderation. She enjoys these things, but she does so reasonably. She retreats to her dark rooms when she needs to.

She doesn’t have the time to be laid up sick every day, sweetness turning sour in her stomach. 

&

Lysithea is like a locket. She is good at keeping secrets. She is good at keeping it all inside.

But she is getting worse at keeping it all locked away. 

Things break free, seep up from the back of her mind. Thoughts, feelings. There is so much inside her, so much darkness that makes up her person, she can’t let it out. 

But she has begun wanting to.

* * *

Annette is an accident waiting to happen.

Lysithea is well aware of her friend’s penchant for tossing things on the floor for no particular reason in addition to the strange magnetism furniture inexplicably acquires in her presence, all mundane, garden variety unluckiness, but... then she learns.

Annette is permanently barred from kitchen duty. And is no longer allowed on flight patrol. And only permitted near the gardening shed with a chaperone.

Lysithea has many questions. So she asks.  
  
Annette, though sheepish, is the honest sort, especially about her own shortcomings. Her humbleness does not do her many favors when recounting Lysithea of the first moon at the monastery when she set the kitchen on fire trying to fry bread, or the time she shattered every single pot in the greenhouse in one glorious sweep aided by nothing but gravity and a spoon. Annette was also the one who blasted that hole through the wall in the training grounds, and regales Lysithea with no small amount of mortification of a story of the barrel in the entry hall that nearly sent her to the infirmary. 

Lysithea has many, _many_ questions. But she cannot find an eloquent way to put them without wanting to tear her own hair out.

Instead, it makes Lysithea pay closer attention to her on the battlefield. 

They often find themselves battling close together. Annette is a windstorm- quick, nimble, her spellwork sharp and her wind devastating; she is decimation, controlled chaos. She sucks others in. Lysithea is best as blowing them away, blowing them _out_. Even her faith is better suited to harm than to heal, but that is yet another aspect Annette unearths of Lysithea.

Annette is a powerful mage. But even here, she is clumsy. She falls in a hole on a training mission. Bumbles up in the clutches of a shrub. Twists her ankle in the middle of a perplexingly flat field. Lysithea’s faith is middling at best, but she takes it upon herself to tend to her friend when she starts to notice this pattern of foolishness, regardless.

Lysithea must touch someone to heal them. Mercedes can simply look at someone across the field and heal them, but this is frustratingly beyond Lysithea’s ability. So, she must touch Annette.

So, Annette must roll up her sleeves, shed her cloak, occasionally roll down a stocking. Lysithea touches her and she discovers Annette is covered in freckles the way Lysithea is covered in scars.

Lysithea touches her and Lysithea wonders if she is making a mistake. 

A year goes by fast- nine have gone by in the blink of an eye- and in less than six moons so will this one be over. She is spending so much unnecessary energy on this, on _worrying_ . What is the point in becoming so invested in these people she will never see again, these friendships that will matter nothing when Lysithea is ashes because _she ran out of time_.

She comes to this realization on a bright and chilly day in late Horsebow Moon when she takes her hands off Annette, at once both too quickly and far too slow. The other girl thanks her and rubs her eyes, which are red. Laughs and says something self-deprecating. Lysithea has heard enough. 

She turns to go, but then Annette’s hand is on her cheek.

It tingles, then itches. Annette pulls her fingers away, and laughs again. Her fingers stained red where they touched Lysithea.

Annette was a powerful healer too.

&

Lysithea has made a mistake. She is made of weakness, but does not allow herself many mistakes. Cannot allow them.

Her body does not always abide.

Lysithea’s body is weak, her constitution frail, she struggles to run or heft a weapon and wearies every day climbing every blasted stair to the library; but it is still _her_ body, and she must work with what she has. She doesn’t feel _well_ most days, and does her best to persevere besides, but sometimes the very thought of food churns her stomach and her body trembles under the strain of simply holding her quill, every action a misery, every breath a battle. She has fought for nearly every single one of her fifteen and half years, and few have been kind.

That day had been one of the bad ones. Her head swam from the moment she rose from bed, and when she is unable to keep down the barest sips of tea, she curls up on the floor, head between her knees, and makes herself count to one hundred in an effort not to cry. It is so very difficult. She is made of weakness.

Eventually, she rises and dresses for class. Wipes her eyes, dabs the blood from her chin and the rim of her teacup with a handkerchief she then tucks under her mattress to launder later. When she gathers her materials for her reason lecture, she brings one additional item; not for class, but for herself. It is weakness. But she wants her near. Needs something to hold on days like this.

Once she’d had quite the collection. Cloth and wooden and even some made entirely of pale eastern porcelain. The porcelain dolls had fetched the best price, and had naturally been the first to go. 

Now, so few remained- the few that had no value but their sentimentality, the ones she couldn’t bear to part with. Juliet was her favorite. Made of soft cloth, cut in round shapes with long flaxen curls, she was threaded with malleable wire that allowed her to be sat and positioned. She sits easily in Lysithea’s lap or nestled in her sleeve, and no one ever has to know. No one ever has to question her strength.

When afternoon lectures are over, Lysithea quickly absconds for the library. Burying herself in her research is the only combat to this dismal weakness. They have made no plans to meet up that day, so she will be left alone, blissfully, wholly alone.

She gets there, sets up under the stairs with her books and inkwell and the candied ginger Raphel slipped her with a smile and a clap to the back, lights a candle, melts into the shadows. Juliet is set on the table, far away from the ink and parchment, soft knees bent underneath her and facing Lysithea.

She is alone. For the first time that day, she can breathe without covering her mouth.

“Lysithea?”

Another mistake. Lysithea shouldn’t have assumed she was the only one who preferred their spot.

Annette peers at her from behind a bookshelf. Her arms are full, and her eyes are wide, and she’s starting to smile.

She comes closer, saying something- she had noticed Lysithea’s twitchiness, she had worried about her- setting her books atop the table beside Lysithea’s own. One tumbles off the stack lands near Juliet, and when Annette goes to retrieve it, she spots her.

She looks at Lysithea. Lysithea looks at her. She cannot picture what sort of expression she is making. She only hopes there is no blood.

“May I see it?” Annette asks. 

Lysithea nods once, a jerky motion. There is sickness in her throat, but she acquisesses once again when she has no reason to.

Annette picks Juliet up. She examines her, fingers running through her soft hair, expression at once both painfully soft and miserably conflicted.

“She’s beautiful.” She says eventually, sounding like she means it.

She then takes Juliet, and with absolute care, sets her atop a stack of books, crossing her legs at the ankle and arranging her skirts modestly. Annette brushes a few curls out of Juliet’s eyes and smiles, satisfied. Lysithea has made a mistake.

Annette sits down across from Lysithea. She takes out her own books. She gives her a smile but doesn’t say anything else. She and Juliet stay right where they are.

They stay there all night.

* * *

Annette is an oddity. 

She is noble, but she cooks (albeit poorly, it is still a skill) and cleans and doesn’t complain about either. She can mend a tear, shine a boot, muck out a horse stall, all with a smile. 

She is good with makeup- as good as Hilda, if not better- and wears sweet perfume that makes Lysithea want her own bottle. She can blow a grown man away in her gale, but has no self-esteem.

She is loud, and excitable, and stubborn, and she is lonely, lonely in a bone-deep way Lysithea knows even if she doesn’t know precisely _how_ , how she could possibly be lonely when she is so adored by all who meet her. 

And she is always singing. 

She sings hymns in choir, recites spells in melody, charms classmates like snakes, scratches rhymes in the margins of notes and on her hands about anything, about everything, steaks and cakes and beasts from swamps, libraries and dusting and weeding and homework. She sings to the stray animals, to the books she returns to shelves, to her boots as she laces them up. She doesn’t tend to sing for others, at least not on purpose, but sometimes she sings for Lysithea. 

And sometimes... they hold hands. Little fingers locked in childish pinky promises that linger; palm to palm comparing textures, discovering wind magic dries out the skin and dark magic leaves pale scars; fingers interlacing under their shared desk when exam results are announced; Annette’s steady hand over hers as she gently guides Lysithea into offering a chunk of roll to a curious duck. 

But, most frequently: when they walk back to the dorms late at night, when it's dark and their imaginations get the better of them (it’s not just Lysithea, for once it’s not just her). 

They walk so close, Annette’s shoulder brushing against hers. It makes Lysithea feel protected, safe in a way she rarely experiences anymore. Her hand a tether, her presence a ward. She jumps at shadows, but Annette herself is the light.

And it is odd, the way she makes Lysithea feel. Chest tight, hands shaking, butterfly kisses in her stomach. Lysithea develops odd habits, having to blink more when they make eye contact and fussily rearranging her hair before they meet up when she’s known for years there’s only one style it cooperates in.

She wants her attention- not just directed at her, but to _hold_ it. She wants to hold _her._

&

Annette is like a music box. Precious by design. Lovely, inside and out. 

&

Annette is like a song. 

She is the nonsense that gets stuck in Lysithea's head as the hours grow small, the flickers she chases in the candle wick when Lysithea becomes distracted and stares off into the flame.

Lysithea longs to memorize her, more than any hymn, better than any spell.

Annette is always singing, or humming under her breath. Lysithea often finds herself joining in too. They fill the empty library, the dining hall before breakfast, the back corners of the Blue Lion classroom on the floor crammed between bookshelves, two small girls, they fill the space with themselves, with their melody.

Annette makes music in everything she does. And Lysithea has gotten so used to only singing alone. 

* * *

Annette is like a storybook. 

Lysithea wants to know what she holds, but cannot rationalize the severity of it. 

Annette is Lysithea’s friend. Her dearest one. Her desire to know will not make her rush through the pages all the same; she does not want to pull anything from Annette she does not want to give. Annette affords Lysithea all her secrets, does not pry at the locket without the key. It’s only right she extends her the same consideration.

She spends so much time thinking about it, however. Thinking about her. She wants to know how the story ends. 

She finds her reading the Compendium of Light and Dark one evening after class. It’s late, the classroom cast in a warm autumnal gold as the sun sets, and Annette is still at her desk, knees pulled up in her chair. She had been here a while. There is no candle lit.

Annette greets her and Lysithea draws near, peering over her shoulder. She knows this tome cover to cover, has poured over every page countless late nights, certain the solution was within, under her fingertips- that all she needed to banish her darkness was the light.

Many moons into her faith training, that still remains to be seen.

But Annette is fascinated, so Lysithea indulges her. She points out the useful theorem and warns her of the sections the authors take liberties with, answers her questions and offers her own experiences.

Annette is enrapt, ecstatic, blushes and smiles, laughs and thanks her. She is working hard, pledging to work ever, super, duper, extra harder.

And Lysithea realizes. Annette inspires her; wholeheartedly, unendingly. More than just in her quest to save herself, to perfect her craft. She inspires her to _grow_ , to _reach_ , to _want_.

She is her metric, her rival, her friend.

Lysithea confesses such. It’s easy, she loses nothing to tell Annette this. Annette, as ever, rises to the challenge and confesses the same. 

And, oh… how it makes Lysithea’s heart leap in her chest. It is _not_ easy, this revelation of the way she feels, but just as there are two Crests within her being, Annette too has become a part of her in nearly every way.

But just as with her two Crests, something also must be lost if Lysithea has any hope to survive.

There is no other way the story ends.

&

Annette is like a fairytale. Something she should have outgrown. 

She is something Lysithea enjoys in the privacy of a secluded corner, tucked under a blanket, far away from any that would tease her, and shoves high upon a shelf when done- out of sight, out of mind. Out of reach. 

Lysithea used to collect precious things, once upon a time. Beautiful porcelain dolls and ceramic figurines, storybooks with gold embossed edges and music boxes inlaid with lapis and pearl. She was taught from an early age to care for her things, to place them on high shelves so they wouldn’t become damaged by being left within easy reach.

Those things are gone now. Lysithea let them go willingly when it became required of her.

But she doesn’t want to let this go. These moments of peace and understanding and the closest thing to contentment Lysithea has been capable of grasping for nine years now. She feels like a princess from one of her favorite fairy tales, lorn in a tower for her savior when she knows no help is coming. The curse will consume her first.

And she doesn't have time for this. Lysithea isn't turning into a pumpkin when the clock strikes midnight, she's dying. 

_I'm dying_.

She’s dying and doesn’t have time for any of this, to be dragged around to all these frivolous things; there are only so many hours in a day, so many days in a month, a year. Every year grows shorter, goes by faster, and she just doesn’t have _the time._

Annette works hard because she has her whole life ahead of her. Lysithea must because her very life depends on it. 

It’s upsetting, and frustrating. Annette opens up to her with time but there are so many things Lysithea can’t tell her, so much skin she must cover even on the hottest days, handkerchiefs and books of magic so dark she must hide them before she comes over to her room. 

The locket is coming open despite it all. All her secrets will fall out.

After that night in the library, Annette is more attuned to her sick days, as good as Lysithea is hiding it normally. She doesn’t pry, but they go for more walks, take breaks and sit on the dormitory stairs and feed the strays with Felix. Annette does her makeup for the winter ball and when she leans close, Lysithea can count every freckle and eyelash and feels each one taking a year of her life away.

She’s _dying_. But she’s never felt so alive.

&

Distantly, the cathedral bells chime midnight, causing them both to jump. 

Lysithea blinks, her meandering thoughts stumbling back to her. They are in the library, studying for their warlock certifications. Before her, her cup of sweet apple tea steams lightly. Annette must have warmed it back up for her when she wasn’t looking.

 _How had she missed that_ , when she was watching the way Annette’s ink-stained fingers fuss with her bangs-

"We should probably get to bed." Annette says, righting the inkwell she’d knocked over in surprise. Lysithea feels similarly upended. "We have that early choir practice in the morning after all."

“You’re right.” Lysithea agrees after a moment, and begins gathering their materials. “Shall we walk back then, Annie?”

“Yes! Let’s.”

Annette accepts her part of the shared load, shifting her books to one hand, and offers the other to Lysithea.

Lysithea reaches for her without hesitation, entwining their fingers. For a moment, they simply stand, settling into one another. Annette leans over to blow out the candle, and squeezes Lysithea’s hand when the library goes dark.

Lysithea squeezes back. Another confession, though unspoken. She finds herself confessing a little bit every day now. 

In bits and fragments, perhaps one day they’ll collect into something tangible. 

They make their way back to the dormitories. For now, there’s still time.

**Author's Note:**

> wheezing I'd like to make a series out of this, with the next one taking place in dual perspectives over the timeskip so I hope I'll get my act together and do that but in the meantime, catch me on Twitter @mistressakira12 . I write and draw and sometimes finish stuff.


End file.
